Christie, McGreevey, and second chances

Seemingly unlikely but evidently genuine, the alliance between current and former NJ governors Chris Christie and Jim McGreevey is more about second chances of the personal, than political, sort.

Republican Christie, who struggles with his weight, and Democrat McGreevey, whose struggle with homosexuality (not to mention, egregiously bad judgment) led to his resignation in 2004, have found common ground about the need to expand treatment for addiction.

McGreevey has a prison ministry serving female inmates; Christie became interested in treatment programs as a Morris County freeholder in the 1990s, and has sat on a private treatment facility's board. Both see addiction as a disease, which won't help Christie secure the far-right support he supposedly needs to be a viable GOP presidential candidate.

But there he was Wednesday, sitting next to McGreevey in front of a display of the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, inside the women's section of the Hudson County Correctional Facility in Kearny. The two listened as inmates talked about the battle to recover from addiction.

"Yesterday informs who we've been but it doesn't inform who we can be," Christie said.

Added McGreevey, "I believe Democrats and Republicans meet in a place like this and understand the importance of healing souls."